Masquerade
by obsidians
Summary: This is a one shot written in honour of Halloween. Sometimes pretending to be other people makes it easier for nervous teenagers to act on their feelings


Masquerade

I do not own Ranma ½ or its characters; Rumiko Takahashi does and I make no money from writing this story.

Ranma watched Akane in her costume, she looked adorable, she was dressed as a Spanish dancer with a red bodice overlaid with black lace and a red skirt trimmed with more black lace. On her head she wore a black lace mantilla veil with red roses at the top and carried a black lace fan. The mask she wore was also black lace and gold hoop earrings flashed bewitchingly under her soft dark hair. He admired how the costume fitted her pretty, petite figure and brought out her soft brown eyes. He had truly never seen her look so feminine and elegant at the same time.

There was a Halloween dance at their school that night and Akane was going. "Are you sure you don't want to come Ranma?" Akane asked for the umpteenth time, she was hoping that the pigtailed martial artist would change his mind.

"Nah, high school dances are lame and guys in costumes are just stupid," he replied. Akane was disappointed by his answer, but didn't let him know that.

Instead she did her customary "harrumph" and said "I guess I shall just have fun at the lame dance on my own then" she said coldly.

"Like anyone would want to dance with an uncute tomboy like you!" Ranma said, wanting her to display her fiery temper. He was more comfortable with the normally unfeminine tomboy then this vision of loveliness before him.

Instead Akane looked extremely sad and said "dummy" with no enthusiasm. "Good night Ranma" she whispered before stepping out the door. Ranma watched her skirt twitch as until she blended into the other costumed revelers. He felt that he had disappointed her and felt uncharacteristically bad about this.

Struck by inspiration, he ran to his closet and pulled out a costume he had worn a couple of years ago, it was fairly large, so should still fit. He donned the black pants, the bat winged black shirt, mask, cape and large, wide brimmed black hat. He reached into the closet and pulled out the fake fencing sword and became Zorro. With a grin at the mirror, he leaped out of the window and made his way towards Furinkan High.

Akane glanced around the gym, the place had been transformed into a living nightmare; everywhere she saw fake gravestones, spider webs and jack o lanterns. The dry ice machine made the image complete and even the food and punch had taken on a scary caste with gummy bugs and fake eyeballs placed throughout the table. The dj was dressed as a zombie and upon occasion would put on Thriller and the drama class would do the zombie dance that they had rehearsed for weeks.

The students themselves had gone all out, becoming pirates, witches, angels or devils. Akane counted the number of black cats in attendance, she knew that that indicated un-inspiration in terms of costume: seven of them.

Males from the minute she walked in, had surrounded Akane; every one of them wanted to find her a seat, get her some punch or dance with her. She kept on politely saying no and glancing around to see if Ranma was going to show anyway. Disappointed, she was almost ready to go home, when a familiar voice said "Would you care to dance Senorita?"

Akane's doe-brown eyes went wide to see Ranma dressed as Zorro. "R-Ranma?" she said in surprise.

"Call me Zorro," he replied with a smile. "What's your name Senorita?" he asked.

"Esperanza" Akane answered, giving him the first Spanish name she could think of.

"You look lovely tonight Esperanza" Zorro informed her.

She smiled with happiness when Ranma actually admitted she was attractive for once. "You look very handsome tonight Zorro" she said, playing along with him.

A slow song came on and Ranma held out his hand "So would you dance with me Esperanza?" he inquired. She nodded, not trusting herself to speak and walked forward into his arms. Ranma experienced an almost giddy feeling to have the girl he loved in his arms. She leaned her head against his chest; she seemed to fit perfectly against him as if designed for him alone. He held her supple, angelic body firmly against his, as if afraid she would drift away if he released her. She swayed in time with him; he could feel her body heat and her warm breath on his neck while she softly breathed.

As for Akane, she reveled in the feeling of his muscular body against her own, she could smell soap on his clean warm skin and allowed her fingers to stroke his braid, he pulled her closer when she did this. Feeling daring, she moved her hand up and stroked the nape of his neck, he moaned softly and settled his chin on top of her head. She almost gasped when he placed a feather light kiss briefly against her hair. "You dance divinely Esperanza" he whispered, really enjoying his first time slow dancing with a girl, especially because it was Akane.

She tilted her head back and gave him the special smile that always warmed his heart. "You too Zorro" she whispered, he almost moaned in disappointment when the dance came to an end and they were forced to part. He held out his hand "would you care to get some air Esperanza?" He coaxed.

Akane sucked in a breath at her excitement and placed her slim hand into his more powerful one "I'd love to Zorro" she replied.

She allowed herself to be guided outside. She was confused when he led her into the darkest shadows of the parking lot and ducked between two buildings. She gasped softly when he drew her into his arms and gently cupped her chin in his hand, stroking the velvety skin there and studying her beautiful face. Then leaned forward and placed his lips against her own. Akane moaned and tilted her head slightly to better accept the silken lips against her own. The kiss was soft, yet passionate and expressed just a hint of longing and desire. When Akane kissed his back, Ranma felt bold enough to tentatively slip his tongue into her mouth and lazily stroked it against her own. Akane tightened her arms around him slightly and moaned into his mouth. They kissed for about a minute then reluctantly separated. Ranma whispered, "Happy Halloween Akane, you really do look beautiful tonight"

She almost skipped with happiness while he continued to hold her hand when they went back inside.

Happy Halloween Everyone!


End file.
